


Cold Since You Left

by Burning_Nightingale



Category: The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Angst, Canonical Character Death, Comes Back Wrong, Horror, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-14
Updated: 2018-02-14
Packaged: 2019-03-12 19:36:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 640
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13554150
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Burning_Nightingale/pseuds/Burning_Nightingale
Summary: At night, Beleg returns to him.





	Cold Since You Left

**Author's Note:**

  * For [havisham](https://archiveofourown.org/users/havisham/gifts).



> This plotbunny just dug its teeth in and wouldn't let go. Hope you enjoy it!

At the burial of Beleg Cúthalion, Túrin Turambar speaks only once.

“Would that I could lie there in the dark earth beside him,” he says as they stand looking down on the body, just before they refill the grave. “Only then would I be at peace.”

At the burial of Beleg Cúthalion, Gwindor of Nargothrond says nothing.

*

Something follows behind them.

Túrin, locked in his grief, has noticed little on their trek save Gwindor’s directions and the food that is pressed into his hands, but Gwindor has known for weeks. He doubts Túrin would have marked their follower’s presence even had he been fully aware; whatever trails behind never comes close enough to be seen or heard, and Gwindor himself is not quite sure how he knows that they are pursued. But the awareness tingles in the back of his mind, a nagging tug that he cannot deny. He fears what he would find if he doubles back to look for whatever has made them its quarry; instead he drives Túrin on faster, restless worry plaguing his mind.

Still, he tells the scouts of Nargothrond that they are alone, and have not been tracked by agents of the Enemy. So desperate is he to go home, he drives all thoughts of their silent pursuer from his head and lies through gritted teeth, praying the scouts will not sense what he does.

The scouts suspect something, and they are led forward blindfolded and bound at the wrist; but they are led to Nargothrond nonetheless.

*

After so long in the wild, the confines of Nargothrond’s hidden halls are uncomfortable, constricting around Túrin’s mind like the wire of a snare pulled tighter and tighter around a rabbit’s foot. Some nights he wanders the halls, restless, and feels the winding caverns close in and squeeze the air from his lungs.

Sometimes, in the flicker of the torchlight, he swears he can see the walls move. Breathe.

And some nights, he dreams. Some nights Beleg returns to him, a silent shadow moving across the darkened room after the candle is blown out. Some nights Túrin lifts the blankets and Beleg slips in beside him, just as he used to in Amon Rûdh, what feels like a lifetime ago now.

Túrin tries to speak of his grief; how he curses fate, the gods, his own hand, and the black, evil sword that even now is in the forges deep beneath, being repaired at the behest of the King, though Túrin would sooner have seen it thrown into the river.

Beleg stops him with a soft finger on his lips. “Sorrow no more, my Túrin. I am here, am I not?”

“In my mind only.”

Even in the dark, Túrin can see Beleg’s smile.

*

Túrin begins to wonder if he is going mad.

Every day his maid complains of a smell she cannot find the source of. He dismisses her concerns, but at night he begins to smell it too, a creeping scent that mixes age and damp stone with wet earth and the sharp tang of iron. Across the room Gurthang mutters to itself in the darkness, its rough voice growling an old, forgotten tongue.

When Beleg slips into his bed Túrin says, “You are real, aren’t you.”

Beleg makes no answer; he lays a hand on Túrin’s chest, just over where his heart beats be  neath his skin. Túrin has never noticed quite how cold Beleg is now, as if ice runs under his skin in place of blood. He shivers.

When he kisses Beleg’s mouth he tastes gravedirt, thick and cloying. “But you are still dead,” he whispers against Beleg’s cold, blue lips.

“Does it matter?”

Túrin pulls Beleg’s cold, unbending form closer, shivering despite the furs piled on the bed. “No,” he whispers, “It does not matter. It does not matter at all.”

**Author's Note:**

> I guess this also fills your "deranged Túrin kissing Beleg's corpse" prompt...? ;)


End file.
